Sunny Side of the Doc, an important market dedicated to non-fiction, annually receives productions from all over the world, mainly interested in generating alliances with various industry agents and with their peers in the sector. This year, two Chilean producers attend the event accompanied by Chiledoc, the Chilean documentary sector brand.
La Ventana Cine, a production company founded by Carola Fuentes and Rafael Valdeavellano, attends the market with projects and films in different stages of development. One of them is Breaking the Brickdirected and produced by Fuentes and Valdeavellano.
The documentary, which is already finished, arrives at Sunny Side of the Doc with the aim of securing sales for the film, something important especially ad-portas to premiere at Sheffield Doc/Fest, the most important festival of the genre in the United Kingdom . Breaking the Brick It is proposed as a sequel to Chicago Boys (2015), directed and produced by the same duo, and which portrays the group of economists that promoted neoliberalism in Chile.
“Breaking the Brick It is a film that takes place in Chile, but runs through the veins of all of Latin America. We already told the story of the origins of the model, in our first film. Today we have recorded the end of that cycle, with two characters who at first seem to come from antagonistic worlds, but who later allow us to understand that they coexist in a country that is mutating, while they themselves undergo a profound transformation”, comments the director Carol Fuentes.
In addition, a project that also talks about transformations will participate in the market. A trip to the roots, directed by José Manuel Loyola and produced by Carola Fuentes and Rafael Valdeavellano, tells the story of Adán, a man who returns to his territory to reconvert his community to Mapuche spirituality and worldview. After the death of his parents, he will accept the design of his pewmas –premonitory dreams– to assume as the new lonko, and recover his ancestral lands usurped by the State of Chile.
“For more than five years, Jota Loyola, the director, has been recording the path that the characters have traveled in this time. A family that opened the doors of their world to us, and that has allowed us to reach the depths of their ties, their fears and their dreams. In a country that has changed and that has also made them change in an unexpected way”, adds Fuentes. Adán, a project that is in an advanced stage of development, assists the market looking for co-production possibilities.
plurality of voices
Another prominent Chilean production company attending Sunny Side of the Doc is Cabala Producciones. In the last ten years, it has maintained audiovisual coverage throughout the Latin American region, on issues of science, nature and the environment with productions such as the series Children of the Stars (NTGEO) or paradises in danger (ART).
“Sunny Side is an excellent instance to strengthen international co-production ties, in our case between Latin America and Europe, for single documentaries and documentary television series focused on the dissemination of nature, conservation and science”, comments Gonzalo Argandoña, founder and executive producer of the production company.
Chiribiquete, the lost civilization del Amazonas is one of the projects with which the production company is attending the French market this year. Directed by Paul-Aurélien Combré and Gonzalo Argandoña and produced by Diego Rojas and Eric Ellena, the documentary is a journey through the history of human beings on the American continent as they pass through the Brazilian and Colombian Amazons and Chilean Patagonia. “The call for the conservation of places as exceptional as this one becomes urgent”, affirms Argandoña.
On the other hand, it is found Not one less, directed by Paula Rodríguez and produced by Gonzalo Argandoña, Diego Rojas and Claudia Rojas, a documentary series that explores and reveals the thriving Latin American feminist movement based on cases of gender violence and feminicide in Chile, Argentina, Colombia and Mexico. This is a project in development that, so far, has a Colombian and German co-production, but with a view to opening new doors in this important non-fiction film market.
“The artistic and content quality of Chilean documentary series is increasingly recognized in the world. In Sunny Side of the Doc we seek to stimulate the exchange between Chilean series and industry agents from the world of television, and boost the interest of countries such as France and Germany, or the Asian world”, adds Paula Ossandón from Chiledoc.
France as focus
Raúl Vilches, head of ProChile’s Department of Creative Economy, comments that “France is a focus market for our audiovisual industry, which is why ProChile, in a participatory work with the different unions and public institutions in the sector, resolutely supports the filmmakers participating in Sunny Side of the Doc, one of the most important festivals for the sector, in its search for financing and co-production opportunities”.
“This support is part of a broader internationalization effort not only for our documentary filmmakers but for all Creative and Cultural Industries, since they are a contribution to diversification and the addition of value and quality to our exportable offer,” he explains.
For her part, Paula Ossandón, director of Chiledoc, affirms that “we arrived at Sunny Side of the Doc together with two companies with great experience in the production of series and content for television: Cábala Producciones and La Ventana Cine. Both stand out for addressing new, contingent issues with a great impact on the audiences”.
The virtual participation in the Sunny Side of the Doc market in La Rochelle, France, is financed by Prochile and managed by Chiledoc, the national documentary sector brand.
Chilean production companies land in the prestigious French documentary market